My Favorite Little Lady

It occurred to me last night that I'm always writing monthly updates on Gerry, but I never do one for Bailey.  Now that she's 3 and not necessarily doing something "new" every month I don't always have new things to write about, but I wanted to take a minute and do a little Bailey update now.  Because she is, in a word, incredible.

She's 3 years and 5 months old now, and smarter than I ever could have imagined.  She loves to draw and, in the last few months, has really started drawing some great stuff.  Mostly people, but she's giving them faces and feet and you can actually tell that they're people and not just scribbles on a page.  I've never shown her how to draw a person, so I can't take credit for her newest artistic ability, but I'm pretty impressed with how well she's coming along.

Our family portrait

Her favorite foods right now are corn and broccoli.  I know...vegetables?  At 3, I think I was horrified at the prospect of having to look at a piece of broccoli let alone eat it, but she loves it and will happily subsist on nothing but veggies.  Don't get me wrong, she loves her sweets, too.  The girl can pound a bag of m&ms like nobody's business.  But when given the choice, she chooses corn and broccoli 9 times out of 10.  Just like me, though, she's not a fan of milk unless it's in cereal.  And don't even think about offering her a sandwich.  That's like a slap in the face to her taste buds and she will shoot you down every time.

I don't know how this happened, but Bailey is turning into a girly-girl.  Her favorite color is pink, she's obsessed with princesses, and she thinks a pair of "fancy shoes" and a tiara complete any outfit.  She's obsessed with lip gloss and LOVES to paint her nails and wear jewelry.  The other day she told me she wanted to go to a fancy dinner.  Then she looked me up and down and said, "But you have to fix your hair, mom.  And blow dry it.  Then we can go to a fancy dinner."

Her very first dance recital...just shy of 3 years old.

Tiara, pajamas, and high heels

She's got very strong opinions and knows exactly what she wants.  I admire that about her, even though it can drive me crazy sometimes.  If she wants to wear pajamas to the mall there's no changing her mind.  If she decides she wants to be a princess there's no convincing her otherwise.  If she feels she's been wronged she's not afraid to let you know it.

But she's also got this sweet, affectionate side to her that I absolutely adore.  Often, she'll stop what she's doing to come over and lay her head in my lap and say, "I love you, mama".  (When she's feeling super affectionate she calls me Mama.  When she's feeling sassy it's Mom)  She says please and thank you without needing prompting most of the time, and she always says things like, "You're the best mom ever!"  When we're apart (which isn't very often), even if it's only been for a half hour, she exclaims "Mommy!  I missed you!"  When Scott comes home from work at the end of the day, she's quick to give him a hug and yell, "Daddy!  My daddy's home!"  She calls Gerry "Handsome Man" and hugs him ALL THE TIME.

A few months ago, I had back surgery and was stuck in bed for a few days.  She climbed up in bed with me that first day and didn't leave my side except to go to the bathroom and to eat.  I was on painkillers and kind of fuzzy for awhile, but I distinctly remember rolling over to find her there with me many different times.  She was perfectly content just sitting there with me and watching tv.  

The other day, I was putting her to bed and I noticed that she had a picture of my grandfather (who is still living) propped up against the jewelry box on her nightstand.  I asked her if daddy had put it there and she said, "No, I did.  I just love Pop Pop and I miss him every day."  A week later, the picture is still there and she adjusts it every night before going to bed.

She has the most fantastic imagination, I swear.  Whether she's playing with her babies or her dollhouse, or building something with tools, she's always got some story about what she's doing and why.  This morning I found her banging on the pantry door with a toy hammer.  "I'm just hitting the door, Mom.  My baby needs a tunnel so I'm making one for her 'cause she's my sweetie."  Last night she was playing with her dollhouse dolls and had two of them engaged in some deep conversation about who was going to sleep in which bed and why.  Complete with tears and everything.

As grown up as she likes to think she is, though, she's still got some "baby" qualities when it comes to her speech.  For instance, she still calls bananas " 'nanas", the computer is her " 'pooter", and she sometimes still adds an extra "s" to plural words ("I'm going to read all these bookses!")  Most of the time she substitutes the y-sound for l-sounds at the beginning of words ("I yuv cookies!").  I don't often correct her because I know that she's going to grow out of it soon and will start saying words correctly.  And I'm so going to miss her "baby speech".  So much.  The day she stopped calling her blanket a "bubby" I was sad and refused to call it by it's proper name until I realized how ridiculous I was being.

My absolute favorite thing about Bailey right now is the way she interacts with her brother.  She is an amazing big sister and Gerry is so lucky to have her.  She's got a never-ending supply of patience, kindness and love when it comes to him and he is the ONLY person that she never gets angry or frustrated with.  She gets excited when he does something new, and her face just glows with pride for him.  Whenever we're out and someone says hello to them she'll tell them, "This is my brother.  He's a baby.  His name's Gerry".  She protects him and she plays with him and she loves him like I never could have imagined.  I don't know why I was so worried about how she'd take it having a sibling.  She's completely awesome.

That's not to say that she doesn't have her moments where she's in full-on tantrum mode and it takes everything in me not to throttle her.  Because it happens.  Not too often, but it happens.  But then she goes and does something so incredibly sweet that it just wipes the slate clean.

I'm lucky that she's my daughter and I love her to the moon and back.  She's sweet and feisty and hilarious and smart and adorable and mine.  I don't know what I did to deserve her, but I'm thankful every single day that she calls me mommy.  I'm proud of her, and I know that she is destined to do some big things when she grows up.  For now, though, I want to keep her "my little girl" for as long as I can.

Gerry: 10 Months Old

Gerry was 10 months old yesterday...and what a 10 months it's been!  He's still happy as ever, but his sleep is a bit off these days.  Scott and I are assuming it's teething, and hoping it doesn't last much longer.  He's been waking up once or twice each night and then pretty early in the morning (for the day).  Still better than Bailey was at this point, though, so who are we to complain?

His newest skill is being able to go from a lying down position to sitting up all by himself.  He's been doing it for a couple of weeks now, and I think he's enjoying the independence.  Still no crawling on all-fours yet, but he gets around just fine by "army crawling" wherever he wants to go.  So now he's pretty much into everything and all over the place.  And he's FAST! He's attempting to pull himself up, but kind of gives up once he gets to his knees.  And he can stand for long periods of time while holding onto the couch...but then he just kind of lets himself crumple in a heap off to the side rather than sitting down.

Gerry is still a great eater, although he's been turning away his bottle lately unless he's tired and ready to go to sleep.  Still not getting much action with a sippy cup, but he does enjoy throwing it on the floor...over and over again.  Which reminds me...his favorite thing to do these days is to make noise.  As much noise as he can possibly make, and however he can possibly make it.  He screams, he babbles, he bangs toys together...the noisier it is for him, the better.  Bailey is still one of his favorite people ever, and I love the giant smile he gets on his face when he sees her. 

Right now, he's doing his evil little giggle/laugh that he does and I'm DYING to get it on camera so I can share it with all of you.  But I'm always too busy laughing when he does it to film him!  One day, I'll get it.

He's got his moments, but G is still one of the happiest, smiliest, best babies I've ever come across.  And, yes, I know that I'm ridiculously biased.

Flame-Free Friday!

*sigh*  Yesterday was Halloween and I'm exhausted!  Bailey was so keyed up that she didn't get to bed until super late (what else is new?) and Gerry has been going through some sleep regression, so he was up about 3 times.  I need sleep!  So I'm just going to jump right into my "confessions"...after these pictures from last night's Halloween festivities.

Superman

Wonder Woman

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Okay.  Moving on.  I confess...

...that I exacted revenge on a child.  Last week we met friends for a play date at the mall's play place.  As is typical for a Friday night, the play place was crowded, and there were a couple of rowdy older kids playing roughly amid all the little ones.  The kids were about 8 or 9, bigger, louder, and rougher than the rest of the group, and their parents either weren't there or didn't care that their little hooligans were terrorizing a play area geared toward much younger kids.  Anyway, I was sitting on a bench chatting with a friend and watching Bailey and her buddy play out of the corner of my eye, and watched these big kids plow into her and knock her flat on her ass a good 4 or 5 times.  Each time, she just got right back up and kept on playing with her friend, fairly unbothered by it all, so I didn't draw any extra attention to it.  Instead, I kept on sipping my coffee and chatting with my friend's husband...and waiting.  I saw the big kid running over from my right, so --quickly and without breaking conversation-- I stuck my foot out and tripped the kid.  He went down hard, a few of the other kids laughed, and I pretended like I didn't even see it.  He ran out of the play place, and we didn't see him again the rest of the night.  I don't condone "violence" or embarrassing others, but I'd do it again if I had to.  I hate punk kids ruining the fun for everyone else.  

...that Gerry peed through his pajamas in the middle of the night last week, and I just threw a clean blanket over it and went back to sleep.  It was roughly 2:45am, I had been up an hour earlier with Bailey, and I just didn't feel like spending the extra 10 minutes changing the sheets in his crib.  So I changed him into clean jammies, threw a thick blanket over the wet sheets, and put him back to sleep.  (I did change and wash all the sheets the next day).

...that I told Bailey she could only eat one piece of her Halloween candy last night, then when she went to bed I ate 6 fun-size candy bars.  I guess I owe her some chocolate.

...that Gerry almost fell down a flight of stairs because I wasn't paying attention.  It's been awhile since I had to keep a close eye on Bailey and the stairs, and I just spaced.  The basement door was wide open and I just happened to catch a glimpse of Gerry, arms and torso hanging over the top step, out of the corner of my eye.  I dove and grabbed his foot just as he was about to go tumbling down, and he just giggled like it was the most fun he's had in all his life...like a possible broken neck was just a game.  I forgot how fast he can drag himself places these days.

...that I went to the store the other day for a few Halloween treats for the kids and ended up buying a book for myself.  We really didn't have the extra money for me to spend, and I have about 64,000 books on the Kindle...but I wanted that book and so I impulse-bought it before I could talk myself out of it.  Along with a new lipstick.  

...that we all went to a Halloween costume party last weekend and I agreed to dress up as Jenny Matrix from Commando (Scott went as Arnold) for the sole purpose that the costume required very little effort and was comfortable.  I didn't have to stress about looking fat in my costume (I wore overalls and goofy sneakers), I didn't have to wear special makeup, and I could just let my hair air-dry after a shower instead of spending time blow-drying and flat-ironing the hell out of it.  Best costume I've worn yet.